Rants on Cycling and on Life:
Photos of people and bicycles that pass in front of my camera

11.14.2006

The Mall... maybe not what you are thinking

I grew up going to the The Mallmaybe not the same type of mall that you are thinkingyes, I went to that type of Mall as wellbut in DC when people say, "The Mall" they are not refering to White Flint, Tysons, or Montgomery Mall which is no longer called Montgomery Mall

no...in DC when someone says, "The Mall" they are referring to the stretch of land downtown that is flanked with museums and home to many national monumentsmy childhood involved all sorts of parades and museum visitsthere were kite flying festivals and revolutionary war re-enactments

I grew older the mall was a place for picnics , frisbee games,and of course ralleys and concertsthat was when The Mall was many city blocks of grassnow the mall is quickly being paved overI have no objection to the MLK Memorialthe Museum of the Native American Indian does not bother methe World War II memorial is just fineit is not the memorials I am againstit is the placement of the memorialsthe removal of green spacegreen space that is rapidly becoming a patchwork quilt of concrete and marbleeach and every new memorial and museum claims to be the lastwhere would the Indians stand on the use of this space?would they be fine in the creation of The Mall Annex 2?the Air and Space musuem has already started in on this ideaand I hear from my two boys that it is amazingbut why not continue to build the future memorials at this area...let there be another green space for people to roam and wander from statue to statue, from museum to museum, from monument to memorialrather than putting everything three inches away from each otherit has gotten to the point that our obesse tourists hardly need their Seagways to get from point of interest to point of interestI understand the placement and proximity of the MLK memorialbutI do not think that the people who are putting the memorials on the mall realize the signficance of the placement of this memorial is due to the fact that The Mall has a history of being a place of protestwhere the people could gatherbut nowthere is less land to gatherfar less grass for a family to throw a blanketfar less grass for the kids to fly a kite or throw a frisbeethe mall is littered with statues and memorialsthe wonderful Korean memorial is less wonderful with its "no touch" policythe Museum of the Native American Indian obstructs the view of the Capitol Building on that Independence Ave approachthe MLK memorial will be an area within the Cherry Blossomsa place where the Cherry Blossoms were fine by themselves

I went to countless concerts and ralliesa mental scrap book of images from many Fourth of Julys

the building needs to be stoppedthe mall needs to halt its over memorializationthe statues and memorials are more significant when they stand alonewhen the monuments crush in close to each other the ideas get blurredthe Jefferson memorial is fantastic in its solitudethe separation of the Washington Monument from the Lincoln memorial by the grand relecting pool made sense... now the WW II memorial breaks up that linkagewhat is next?there will be moresome other group will realize that we need just one more monument, one last museum, one last memorial on our mallnoit has to stop

The Mall still has so much to offerthere is still so much going onbut... the development needs to stopthe Mall is not just for tourists

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